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Here's my theory of when the 40k codexes should be done.
By about the end o this year or early next year.
You: Why?
Because a new codex is released one week after each white dwarf. But since it goes 40k, fantasy, 40k etc. the time will be doubled and the occasional break of showing other things (like armies on parade and what not) this should be reasonably fast.
You: ok but how you know that all armies will get updated?
First why would they leave some codexes non hardcover? That would be slightly strange and a tency bit lazy.
Second their trying to make lots of big moves I.e no metal models now getting more finedast models 6e rules and lots more.

It's going to take them an enormous amount of time to update the new codexes. They take years to release codexes, years upon years.

There are only a few Codex releases per year at maximum, I think Chaos was the only dex last year to get released.

The last soft cover dexes to be released were only released in 2011, and seeing as GW usually takes upwards of 5-6 years in a Codex release cycle, they most certainly will be leaving soft cover dexes on the shelves for the forseeable future.

 TedNugent wrote:
It's going to take them an enormous amount of time to update the new codexes. They take years to release codexes, years upon years.

There are only a few Codex releases per year at maximum, I think Chaos was the only dex last year to get released.

The last soft cover dexes to be released were only released in 2011, and seeing as GW usually takes upwards of 5-6 years in a Codex release cycle, they most certainly will be leaving soft cover dexes on the shelves for the forseeable future.

Last year saw the release of 40k 6th edition and Chaos Marines for 40k, while Fantasy got VC's & Empire.

This year we have fairly good rumors from the H&H team that we can expect;
Dark Angels, Daemons, Tau and maybe Eldar for 40k.
Warriors of Chaos, Daemons of Chaos, High Elves for Fantasy, with Lizardmen being an outside shot in the dark!

7-8 books is a crapload of new stuff.

Experiment 626 wrote:

 TedNugent wrote:
It's going to take them an enormous amount of time to update the new codexes. They take years to release codexes, years upon years.

There are only a few Codex releases per year at maximum, I think Chaos was the only dex last year to get released.

The last soft cover dexes to be released were only released in 2011, and seeing as GW usually takes upwards of 5-6 years in a Codex release cycle, they most certainly will be leaving soft cover dexes on the shelves for the forseeable future.

Last year saw the release of 40k 6th edition and Chaos Marines for 40k, while Fantasy got VC's & Empire.

This year we have fairly good rumors from the H&H team that we can expect;
Dark Angels, Daemons, Tau and maybe Eldar for 40k.
Warriors of Chaos, Daemons of Chaos, High Elves for Fantasy, with Lizardmen being an outside shot in the dark!

7-8 books is a crapload of new stuff.

what rock do you live beneath? DA is allready out and WOC is getting one next weekend

Shh it's still just rumor

yet somehow pp can update everything once a year with better rules and game mechanics. yeah gw is serious business lol

GW is just playing around.

I will give them that their Fantasy models are really cool, and I understand releasing a fleet of 5-7 new models when it has that level of detail is difficult business, but I think they just refuse to staff the Codex writers necessary to get the rules out in time. And regardless of circumstances, anything greater than 6 years for a Codex update is just ridiculous. We have several 4th edition Codexes still in play in 6th edition. It's a little silly if you think about it. But that's my point to the OP: GW doesn't care if there are old outdated codexes. They just don't care. They even refused to use FAQs to introduce balance changes during the last rulebook update. There are still armies without Flakk Missile upgrades, lol.

Anyone who's played 40K for a long time knows that it takes an idiotically long time for GW to update Codexes with each new edition. Usually there are several armies that if they are lucky, get a new codex every two editions, especially when they are not Space marine-based armies.

Codexes like Necrons and Dark Eldar will exist as-is until 7th edition, with just FAQ updates.

They're not lazy they're just... Taking their time :p

Why would GW need to update all of their codices by the end of the year? So that someone can fulfil their OCD need for all codices to look the same? The last time that happened was in 3rd edition, and then they started to change codex cover designs in 4th, and again now in 6th. I don't see GW feeling any need to make all codices share the same cover design standard just for the sake of doing so.

(Edit: Just realised that after Sisters got their WD codex, there were no more 3rd edition codex cover styles any more, so I was wrong on that. Still, the point stands.)

Or is it so that Joe Gamer can feel happy that everything is updated and nothing needs to change for a while? That doesn't mesh at all with GW business philosophy. If you create something that doesn't need to be replaced, then you won't have a steady source of income, it's that simple. Bear in mind that there are 14 codices that need to be updated for 6th; if you expect them all to be replaced within the next year or so, then you are deluding yourself. True, you could argue that several of those codices don't deserve to exist (Marine haters are gonna hate), but that's how many there are now that do not already have a 6th edition update.

Even if it's true that GW is ramping up its release schedule, I still don't see more than 4 codices being completed in any single calendar year. That gives WHFB time to have its own releases, plus a few months of splash/wave/expansion releases that can appeal to players of several armies, not just one at a time.

Hell, if GW manages to get 4 codices released per year, then they could have a more consistent 4-year edition cycle. If they released every codex within 18 months of a new edition, then what do they do?

No, GW is trying to think longer term than that (though to extent of their long term thinking is still questionable).